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Utah Holiday Quilt Show and Auction Runs This Week at Little America Hotel to Help Raise Funds for Medical Research and Education

SALT LAKE CITY, UT – The Intermountain Research & Medical Foundation’s Holiday Quilt Show & Auction is being held at the Little America Hotel today through Thursday, November 3, 2011. The quilt show features more than 70 hand-crafted quilts, all donated to raise money for medical research and education.

The show runs daily from 9:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. on the hotel’s mezzanine level. Admission is $5. You can also see all of this year’s quilts at www.imedicalfoundation.org (scroll down and follow the links to Special Events and then click on the Gallery to see the quilts).

The quilt show auction and dinner — where all of the quilts will be auctioned off — is Friday, November 4, starting at 6 p.m. Tickets are $75 each.

For over two decades, the Holiday Quilt Show & Auction has been a major source of funding to further Intermountain Healthcare’s research and medical education mission. In 1983, several Utah quilters who valued the rich cultural heritage of quilt making organized the show, which has now raised funds in excess of $2.5 million.

Each year, hundreds of volunteers offer their time, talent, and resources to create handmade quilts for the auction. These funds have helped finance more than 300 clinical research projects, acquire state-of-the-art equipment for diagnosis and treatment, support trauma care such as Life Flight and fund the world’s first computerized hospital patient care system at LDS Hospital. This bi-annual event is one of the last all hand-quilted shows in the continental United States.

Besides providing funds for the hospital, the event helps preserve the art of hand quilting. “We appreciate the hard work and craftsmanship of the many volunteers who have worked for the past two years to produce these outstanding quilts,” said Jean Detton, chair of the event. “Each quilt is truly a work of art, and we invite the public to come and see them.”

The auction began as an annual event, but is now bi-annual because of the many hours needed to complete the high-quality work. Each quilt has an individual story involving its conception, design and craftsmanship, which adds to its value. All proceeds are donated to furthering medical education and research and improving patient care at Intermountain Healthcare’s Salt Lake Valley Hospitals, which include Alta View Hospital in Sandy, Intermountain Medical Center in Murray, LDS Hospital in Salt Lake City, Riverton Hospital and TOSH-The Orthopedic Specialty Hospital in Murray.